A terrifying hot weather phenomenon called a “heat dome” has gripped western Canada. With temperatures nearing 50 degrees Celsius, wildfires are ripping through towns and villages, kicking up infernos that are creating 'fire-breathing' thunderstorms.
Amid a record heatwave, over a hundred wildfires are raging on across the Canadian province of British Columbia.
The rising heat and smoke from these firestorms have resulted in a cloud formation called pyro-cumulonimbus or cumulonimbus flammagenitus. These menacing vertical clouds stir up wind and smoke and create their own weather. Instead of showering down raindrops, they spew lightning. The clouds hurled 710,000 lightning strikes on British Columbia and northwest Alberta over a 15-hour period last week, as per the North American Lightning Detection Network.
A fire cloud over Lytton village was documented kicking up a devastating firestorm a few days ago. It destroyed ninety percent of the village. Have a look at its scary formation in the video tweeted by the Weather Network's Alberta Bureau chief:
Extreme cases can also result in ‘fire tornados’ emerging from these storms. An example of this was the ‘firenado’ of central California in September 2020, which had resulted from a 700 kilometre-square wide fire cloud, which itself was created by a forest fire.
NASA’s name for these clouds is 'the fire-breathing dragon of clouds'. Not only do these clouds funnel smoke, but they also trap pollutants in the upper atmosphere.
Fires started by this phenomenon are “extremely hot and chaotic” and nearly impossible for firefighters to put out, with “embers shooting as far as three miles in every direction,” according to Mike Flannigan, director of the Canadian Partnership for Wildland Fire Science.
One can only hope that the weather changes and makes the clouds dissipate.
With climate change, fire cloud formations have increased substantially. While 17 fire clouds were reported across US, Canada and Mexico in 2002, now around 25 form in western North America alone every year.
